Sawt Falasteen - Ukraine, Russia hold first direct talks on latest US peace plan

The US initially drafted a plan to end the conflict that was heavily criticised in Kyiv and western Europe for being too close to Russia's line, while later proposals were criticised by Moscow for floating the idea of European peacekeepers.

Ahead of Friday's talks, which are set to continue on Saturday, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said territory remained the key issue -- with Moscow having said it is not dropping its demand that Kyiv pull out of its eastern Donbas region.

After the first day of talks, Ukraine's chief negotiator Rustem Umerov posted on social media that the meeting had focused "on the parameters for ending Russia's war and the further logic of the negotiation process", adding that meetings were scheduled for Saturday.

The UAE foreign ministry said in an earlier statement the talks were scheduled to last two days and were "part of ongoing efforts to promote dialogue and identify political solutions to the crisis".

Trump met Zelensky at the World Economic Forum in Davos on Thursday and US envoy Steve Witkoff later held talks with Vladimir Putin in the Kremlin.

- Donbas dispute -

The Emirates meeting took place as thousands of people in Kyiv were without heating in sub-zero temperatures due to Russian strikes.

The European Union, which has sent hundreds of generators, accused Moscow of "deliberately depriving civilians of heat".

Kyiv said Russian strikes had killed three people on Friday in the Kharkiv region and four people -- including a father and his five-year-old son -- overnight in the east.

While diplomacy to end Europe's worst conflict since World War II has gained pace, Moscow and Kyiv appear deadlocked over the issue of territory.

Hours after Putin met Witkoff -- and Trump's son-in-law Jared Kushner -- in Moscow, the Kremlin said its maximalist demand that Kyiv withdraw from the eastern Donbas region still stood.

"Russia's position is well known on the fact that Ukraine, Ukrainian armed forces, have to leave the territory of the Donbas," Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said.

"This is a very important condition," he added.

Kyiv, which still controls around 20 percent of the eastern region, has rejected such terms.

- 'God willing' -

Both sides say the fate of territory in Ukraine's east is one of the main outstanding issues in the search for a settlement to a war that has killed tens of thousands, displaced millions and decimated eastern Ukraine.

"The Donbas is a key issue," Zelensky -- who said he and Trump had agreed on post-war security guarantees in Davos -- told reporters on Friday, ahead of the talks.

Later in a post online, he added: "It is necessary that not only Ukraine has the desire to end the war and achieve full security, but that a similar desire somehow emerges in Russia as well."

Russian and Ukrainian negotiators are last known to have met face-to-face in Istanbul last summer, in talks that ended only in deals to exchange captured soldiers.

The Abu Dhabi meeting is the first time they have faced each other to talk about the Trump administration's plan.

Putin has repeatedly said Moscow intends to get full control of eastern Ukraine by force if talks fail.

After the Russia-US talks in the Kremlin, Putin aide Yuri Ushakov insisted Moscow was "genuinely interested in resolving" the war diplomatically.

But he added: "Until that happens, Russia will continue to achieve its objectives... on the battlefield."

Trump repeated on Wednesday his belief that Putin and Zelensky were close to a deal.

"I believe they're at a point now where they can come together and get a deal done. And if they don't, they're stupid -- that goes for both of them," he said.

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R.Halabi--SF-PST